DIVERSITY, EQUITY, INCLUSION: Ending reverse discrimination and restoring equal rights for all

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Issue

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) is a far-left ideological fad imported from the U.S. which is being imposed on all sectors of Canadian society by the Liberal government. This hateful ideology holds that the dominant culture and the entire institutional structure of Western societies is irredeemably racist, colonialist, sexist, homophobic, and transphobic.

According to this doctrine, mere neutrality or equal treatment of individuals is insufficient, as it allows for “unconscious bias” to still have an influence and result in discrimination and disparate outcomes. This systemic disadvantage can only be overcome by prescribing special treatment, or reverse discrimination, for minorities.

The more a person can demonstrate that he or she belongs to various disadvantaged groups – for example, a black Muslim lesbian – the more he or she should be favoured by various programs. Conversely, it is acceptable — or even prescribed — to officially discriminate against white, Christian, heterosexual males who do not identify as another sex or gender.

Section 15(1) of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms states that every Canadian “is equal before and under the law and has the right to the equal protection and equal benefit of the law without discrimination.” Section 15(2) qualifies this by allowing so-called “affirmative action,” that is, “any law, program or activity that has as its object the amelioration of conditions of disadvantaged individuals or groups.”

However, DEI goes much further than simply trying to ameliorate the conditions of disadvantaged people, remove unfair barriers, and provide equal opportunities. It creates legally favoured groups, and groups that can be legally discriminated against on the basis of ethnicity or religion, skin colour, sex, gender identification, and sexual orientation. In so doing, it squarely contradicts section 15(1) of the Charter.

DEI is a fundamentally racist, sexist, and discriminatory ideology that divides Canadians into oppressors and oppressed, creates blatant injustices, and undermines social cohesion. Under the pretext of promoting nice-sounding goals, it does the exact opposite: it imposes a uniform far-left perspective, and unfairly gives more rights to some, while excluding others who don’t fit in official categories of victims. This ideology will have catastrophic long-term impacts on Canadian society.

Facts

The Liberal government is imposing DEI programs and policies directly on the public service and all federal institutions, including the Armed Forces, as well as on federally regulated industries. As a condition to obtain subsidies, grants, loans, scholarships, services, or contracts, the government is also indirectly forcing all kinds of institutions, organisations, associations and businesses to adopt DEI policies.

Such policies do not only mandate discrimination in the hiring process and in the provision of various services. They also aim to police speech and behaviour, and impose conformity of thought at workplaces. You are either actively “anti-racist” and supportive of DEI policies, or you are a racist. According to far-left ideologues, refusing the tenets of DEI is itself proof that someone is intolerant, and should be grounds for disciplinary action or dismissal.

DEI “training” sessions (or more accurately, re-education camps) can have deadly consequences. In 2021, a long-time employee of the Toronto District School Board, Richard Bilkszto, was publicly shamed in front of co-workers by an aggressive DEI trainer, Kike Ojo-Thompson, for questioning her claim that Canada was a more racist society than the U.S. The lack of support by the school board, and the intense mental distress the situation caused him, led him to commit suicide two years later.

Academic freedom, intellectual rigour, and scientific objectivity are threatened by DEI policies in universities, as only professors belonging to favoured groups and willing to bow to the far left DEI orthodoxy are being hired and can receive federal research grants.

DEI ideology also explains various absurd and costly programs such as the decision by the Trudeau government to force all federal and federally regulated workplaces to make free menstrual tampons available in bathrooms, including men’s. Another such program is the Gender-Based Analysis Plus (GBA Plus), a type of analysis now performed on all federal government legislation, policies, programs and other initiatives to ensure that they are “responsive, inclusive and reflective of diverse experiences and realities” that go “beyond gender and sex to include consideration of multiple identity factors such as age, disability, economic status, education, gender, sex and sexual orientation, geography, language, racialization and ethnicity, and religion and spirituality.”

Our plan

Radical adherence to DEI principles undermines one of the key foundations of liberal Western civilization: meritocracy. In a free society where everyone is equal under the law, competence, need, and other objective criteria that are fair for everyone must be the sole ones used by the state and other institutions in their dealings with citizens. It is time to restore equal rights for all.

A People’s Party government will:

• Abolish all federal DEI programs and policies in the public service and in federal institutions such as the Armed Forces, as well as those that apply to federally regulated industries.
• Prohibit DEI training sessions in all federal institutions.
• Remove all DEI clauses imposed on institutions, organisations, associations and businesses as a condition to obtain federal subsidies, grants, loans, scholarships, services, or contracts.
• Stop funding groups that promote the DEI ideology.
• In all legal proceedings, narrowly interpret section 15(2) of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms in a manner that proscribes reverse discrimination.
• Support Canadians who are being discriminated against, harassed, vilified, or harmed in any way by organisations that impose DEI programs and policies.